


Painted Red

by talefeathers



Series: Welcome to the New Age [2]
Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Dystopia, Alternate Universe - Future, Angst, Blood, Future American Dystopia AU, Grief/Mourning, M/M, Sad, Swearing, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-06
Updated: 2013-06-06
Packaged: 2017-12-14 03:51:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,447
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/832380
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/talefeathers/pseuds/talefeathers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Enjolras has suffered within the law as he promised he would, and Les Amis de l'ABC have not let it go unnoticed.  Thanks to a fiery campaign led by cynic, guide, and center, the chief is now the face of the revolution, and the people have risen, demanding his release.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Painted Red

**Author's Note:**

> I raise my flags,  
> Dye my clothes;  
> It's a revolution, I suppose.  
> We're painted red  
> To fit right in.
> 
> \-- "Radioactive," by Imagine Dragons

The crowd that had gathered to receive Enjolras, their savior in red, from his five months in jail would have terrified any regime. There were thousands, fiery thousands, cheering and whistling and waving handmade signs. Because they’d done it, hadn’t they? They’d put a dent in the government’s hard, metal exterior; they’d decided they were through with their young firestarters being silenced. They’d heard that fresh, ringing voice declare that they had power and they’d listened; they’d used it. And it had worked.

When Enjolras finally emerged from the stark building escorted by a pair of guards (both made up for being shorter than their captive by being twice as muscular), the dull roar swelled to pandemonium. 

Courfeyrac pulled Combeferre’s ear to his lips and shouted _“HE’S A FUCKIN ROCK STAR!”_ and for the first time in months Combeferre laughed -- a breathless, bewildered, true laugh. And Enjolras was laughing, too, he saw; bruised and emaciated but laughing, because finally, _finally,_ his hope had been rewarded. He and his friends had sent out the call, and the people had risen to it.

The guards removed the tall blond’s cuffs and Combeferre could see the effort it was taking them to remain straight-faced; against their training, against everything, they admired this young student. Without use of fear or force, without money or status, with only his voice and a ferocious dream, this man, barely more than a boy, had moved thousands. Combeferre could see these military men’s hesitant posture and knew that they wanted to join the swelling numbers. He could see the not-so-distant future, could see the president’s forces laying down their arms. Finally, realistically, he could see victory.

Rubbing his wrists where the cuffs had been, Enjolras made his way toward the crowd, grinning fiercely at the cluster of students at the front -- his friends. He opened his arms as if for a hug.

“Come on, you have to let us by, you have to _at least_ let us by,” Feuilly was pleading with the police perimeter, but in the meanwhile Bahorel had already forced his way through, pulling Courfeyrac, Jehan, Marius and Grantaire behind him in a daisy chain. Combeferre laughed, patting Feuilly’s shoulder and putting an arm around Joly. “Through there, follow them!” They slipped through the gap Bahorel had made, Bossuet barely tripping through before it closed back up behind them.

And then Enjolras was _really_ laughing, head-tossed-back _guffawing_ at his friends running full tilt toward him like a litter of golden retriever puppies. “C’mon, _mush,_ last one here’s a --!”

His shout was cut off with a jerk and a spray of red. His breathless smile dropped off his face, brows coming together in something like puzzlement. He staggered a couple more steps toward his friends. His eyes met Combeferre’s, and Combeferre felt all of the air leave his lungs, heard nothing but a high ringing in his ears. Enjolras dropped to his knees.

Combeferre stopped so immediately that he almost fell forward; his body refused to propel him any further, locked him up as if he was the one who’d just been -- _No. No. No no no no no._

Somehow things were happening both too quickly and not quickly enough. Everything seemed to be occurring at once, but at half-speed. He saw Grantaire let go of Marius’s hand, saw him sprint out ahead of the others, saw him catch their fallen angel. He saw Courfeyrac weeping into Jehan’s hair, rubbing the young poet’s back while the latter sobbed into his shirt. He saw that Bossuet had frozen in much the same way he had, muscles slack, waiting for what had just happened to register. He saw but could not hear Bahorel screaming, trying to fight his way out of Feuilly’s embrace, but Feuilly held fast, blinking past his tears and saying something that looked like _It’s no use. There’s nothing we can do._ He saw Joly kneeling next to their captain, their chief, kneeling across from Grantaire and shaking his head and hiccupping down at his bloody hands, and that was how he knew that they had lost him. Again. For good.

Combeferre rifled through the images he’d just collected. He couldn’t break; _he_ was not allowed. His job was to shelter, to fix. He wanted to be everywhere at once, he wanted to pull all of his boys to him and hide them from this. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, and the first face he saw when he opened them again felt like a punch to the stomach. Grantaire.

He stumbled past his numbness and dropped himself next to the pale, shaking mess that was their cynic. Enjolras was limp in Grantaire’s arms, blood from the hole in his head soaking one side of his face, crawling down Grantaire’s shirt. The ringing in Combeferre’s ears was fading; he could hear Joly as if from a great distance, as if through water or a thick pane of glass. He was saying _I’m sorry,_ over and over again like he couldn’t stop. _I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry._

“There’s nothing you could’ve done, Joly,” Combeferre said, voice scratching its way past the lump in his throat. He reached across Enjolras to give his arm a squeeze. “You have nothing to be sorry for.”

“You can’t do this.” Grantaire’s voice was a shuddering whisper. “Please _please_ I just got you back, I just got you. _Enjolras please.”_

Combeferre released Joly’s arm and closed Enjolras’s eyes. “He’s gone, Grantaire.” Tears finally filled his eyes; saying it out loud like that, brittle voice cracking over jagged syllables, made it true in a way that seeing it hadn’t. He could feel himself locking up, shutting down, but he pressed his lips together in a firm line and forced himself to stay online. 

“He’s not, he _can’t,_ he was laughing -- he was -- _laughing_ \-- fuck Enjolras you can’t you can’t. _I_ can’t. Please, I just. _Fuck.”_ Grantaire’s words tumbled over each other like water over stones, knocking into each other until they were almost unintelligible. His forehead dropped to touch Enjolras’s blood-stained one. Colder, paler. More like marble than ever. “I just got you back.”

Combeferre put a strong arm around his trembling friend. “Come on,” he croaked. “Come on, let’s get him out of here.”

“No -- he can’t --”

“Grantaire, it’s not safe here for us, c’mon, let’s --”

 _“I don’t care!”_ The shout that ripped its way out of Grantaire was so raw that Combeferre flinched. “Fuck, I _want_ ‘em to get me. Finish us both with one blow.” He tried to say more but couldn’t.

“Don’t say that.” Combeferre’s grip on Grantaire’s shoulder became painful. “Don’t say that, Grantaire, don’t throw away what he --” _no no no no_ “-- died for.”

Grantaire only choked out more sobs in response, tangling one hand into their fallen leader’s bloody curls.

 _“Do you see this?”_ Combeferre looked up to see Marius, tear-stained and puffy-eyed and _furious,_ standing before the throng of stunned onlookers. “Do you see what they’re doing to shut us up? Do you see what they’re doing to scare us off, to snuff out the hope and the passion he inspired?” He’d never heard the gangly, awkward law student speak so strongly, had never seen such a light in his eyes. “They’re going to try to make this _our_ fault! They’re going to blame _us,_ Les Amis de l’ABC, they’re going to call it a conspiracy, going to call us a terrorist organization. When the president starts spouting that crap, when you hear that on your radios and you see that on the news, remember this. Remember _them.”_ Marius gestured behind him at the scattered collection of devastated college students. “Remember what happened to the kid who thought we all deserved more than this, who _believed_ we could _have_ more than this. He was killed as an example, so learn from him; learn from him just how scared this government got of _a twenty-two-year-old kid._ Learn from him how much we could do _together.”_

There were no cheers of agreement, no fists thrust into the air. The fire had gone out of the multitude, lost with the life of their chief. There was only a stoic determination -- a silent, tight-jawed agreement to carry on what had been started.

“Come on, Grantaire,” Combeferre murmured, and this time when he gave the sniffling student’s shoulder a little tug Grantaire complied, gently relinquishing his hold on Enjolras’s marble corpse so that he and Combeferre could carry it together. One by one and without saying anything, the rest of Les Amis shuffled to join them, until Enjolras, their savior in red, was being borne away on the arms of his brothers.


End file.
